Unapproved Audit Observations - Part 1

My life revolves around visiting client sites ever so often with my visiting cards in the inside breast pocket of my blazer – almost like a CID pocket shield that I flash on the accountant’s terrified face and post one slap across his skull, having him spurt why he booked a capital expense as revenue.

The adventure mostly ends with micro-management of the articled assistant, correcting his draft of the report for want of 1.15 pt line spacing and justified text alignment. To add to my misery is the stuff that gets edited out from the report by Senior Partner of Sandeep Ahuja & Co.

Here’s taking a leaf out of my book – quite literally – and putting it where at least someone would read and appreciate. Here’s observation #1. True life story.

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Client Name: Confidential

Branch under review: Unnamed District, Jharkhand

Period covered under audit: Quarter 2, Financial Year 2017-18

Scope: Review of Internal Control Systems

Audit Lead: CA Sarthak Ahuja

Observation: During the course of physical verification of fixed assets installed at the office premises, the Audit Lead observed that the plastic seat on the commode was rickety. Efficiency in the working of the asset was tested through a sampling exercise of sitting on the porcelain rim by putting up the plastic seat in a vertical position against the cistern at the back.

Overlooking the aspect of the rim being too cold, severe doubts on the functioning of the asset arose when on turning on the knob for the water jet, a cold stream of water flowed onto the head of the Audit Lead, almost trickling down his back from the collar above.

Cause: On in-depth examination, it was found that the design of the water jet is flawed, whereby the flexible hose through which the water travels into the jet was attached to the bottom of the backside of the plastic rim, as illustrated in Figure 1 and 2.

Effect: An adverse observation has been recorded due to the following reasons:

- The asset not just has a worn out plastic rim that does not stay firm when put down, but the water jet installation is design inefficient;

- The asset led to the auditor’s clothes having drenched in water, especially down the spine of the shirt, making it almost impossible to rationally explain the cause on his way out to the auditee staff. The lack of a shower system in the premises further limited the possible causes that could be used to explain the wetness.

- A trickle or two during accidental excretion of bodily fluids onto the official attire can be explained by an uncontrolled flow of the water tap in the wash basin, especially if the subject purposely splatters water onto his shirt, all the way down to his waist, in an attempt to explain such an incident. However, a trickle down one’s spine is an inexplicable situation adding to the subject’s embarrassment and lack of willingness to live.

Impact: High. The incident explains how if any of the auditee staff members were to accidentally experience the result of such a shortcoming in the installed fixed asset, it would lead to not only loss in morale of the employees, adversely impacting the working efficiency of the human resource, but may also lead to high employee attrition and turnover.

Management Response: The issue was not discussed with the Management at the time of debriefing due to the sensitive nature of the observation – open communication of which may have led to severe consequences such as a reduction in the authority commanded by the audit exercise. Thus, management response is sought through the medium of this report and may be obtained in the form of an Action Taken Report, the format of which is appended herewith.

Recommendation: It is recommended that the fixed asset be replaced at the earliest, with a more design efficient system be installed, such as a health faucet, which is in line with modern day practices of maintaining hygiene at the workplace.

It was also observed that the fixed asset was neither recorded in the Fixed Assets Register, nor bore any sticker signifying the fixed asset number. This would need immediate redressal as negligence in non-recording of an asset in the said register may lead to theft of the asset, which would also skip the notice of the team conducting physical verification of fixed assets.

Thereafter, the cost of the asset newly installed should be added to the gross block and depreciation be charged at applicable rates as prescribed under the relevant schedule of the Companies Act, 2013 as well as under the Income Tax Act, 1961, for respective purposes.  

Thanking you.

Yours sincerely,

CA Sarthak Ahuja

Partner

Your Pace or Mine?

If I write any further, my mother will think that my sole mission with this post is to reduce her street cred in the lanes of Mothers-with-Marriageable-Betas. But truth be told, Alpha her kid is not, and admittedly, as an appreciator of alliteration and puns, a Beta beta has a nice ring to it.

I’m gifted, both genetically and emotionally, to be asked to field in a game of cricket in seventh grade PE period, and make the spectators go aah-ooh when I run after the ball beyond the boundary, and throw it to cover a distance of 5 cubits between myself and the stumps at an angle of twenty-five degrees instead of ninety. Being promoted to the Man-of-the-Match-esque title, “Beech ka Bichhu”, I think I was actually glad that I’d get two shots at batting, and the perks of a Bhatta Ball – with an occasional try-ball at the beginning of each inning.

Football was closer to my heart though. I would run after the ball for five minutes like it was the final episode of Survivor: St. Columba’s School, and soon realize that the point of the game was to increase the heat in your chest to a Fahrenheit that would qualify for a hit reference in a Bipasha Basu starrer Omkara song. I would fall to the ground (for dramatics, because attention-seeking bitch), holding my chest with a heart that would thump like Skrillex deciding never to drop the bass. Open my shirt buttons and you would see redness like I tore my chest apart like Hanuman, apart from witnessing too much chest hair for a twelve year old… the sport was closer to my heart, I told you.

Over the years, and especially while I was taking my CA final exams, I realized that my body was actually doing a Benjamin Button, with returning baby fat and all. In an attempt to not reach a condition where a third person would do my washy-washy, I decided to reverse the reverse-ageing and, contrary to popular belief of every single joint in my knee, to take up a sport.

So I took up one which would allow me to not give an unfair disadvantage to others and be magnanimous like Arnold Schwarzenneger.

I started running.

What they call jogging.

Or what they actually call panting for breath while Lady Gaga’s Applause plays in your ears to build tempo, but the only tempo you can relate to is Ashok Leyland.

In the dark.

When no one would be in the park.

To mistake me for someone in need of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Not that I was getting any while not panting for one.

So, I would run in the moonlight of October 2013 – the silver of the full moon sifting through the carbon-dioxide emitting leaves and making the crescent on my forehead shine in its full glory.

I started small. Five rounds of the park every day for a week. Seven thereafter. Ten. Twelve. Fifteen. And finally, twenty – each round reminding me of the age when we were taught the numbers.

Every single year, at the annual school picnic at Lodhi Garden – there were a few things that would never change –

A guy from the class walking into one of the tombs and coming back to tell the rest that he either saw a ghost of the Mumtaz of the Lodhi who is still haunting the tomb, or better still, that he is possessed by the Mumtaz of the Lodhi, who will pounce at your Blue Lay’s because her death was caused by starvation from lack of Magic Masala.

Second, ten-year olds pelting stones at a man resting his head in the lap of a species from the feminine gender, who wore a dupatta-cum-burqah and exercised her abdominal muscles like biting off the crotch of her salwar – while the boys shouted “Romeo-Juliet” in unison with each pelted stone.

Third, the protagonist of this story coming back home with a fever that wouldn’t go for days four hundred ninety-six.

The same routine sans the spirit and the stones repeated itself when the hero would take annual trips to the Delhi World Book Fair and walk all day on two sticks that never worked more than doing a nocturnal spinaroonie on the bed while sleeping with Dadi Ma and kicking the gut out of her liquid-diet digesting stomach.

My body would catch a fever every time that it was exerted beyond normal. It never did during the annual running season because it would always be on slow counts of five, seven, ten, twelve, fifteen and twenty – spread over two months.

Circa 2017.

The over-enthusiastic, self-delusional bitch now decided to take up running again in the new park behind his new residence in Gurugram three days ago on account of a three-day-holiday, long-weekend, no-GST-calls, thank-god, whatever you may call it.

And ran twenty frickin’ rounds for two days straight, thinking haha, I’m a runner, bitch. I listen to Tamma Tamma on loop and kick the shit out of Gurugram’s morning runners, owning their patooties like no one’s ever pwned them before.

The last two days have gone rolling on my bed, trying to convince my family that I’m dying; taking medical advice from a second-year student of medicine who said exertion can never cause fever because it’s common sense that it doesn’t, and then looking up an article on Livestrong<dot>com to prove him wrong, while coming to terms with the fact that telling family about eminent death was actually not a joke, but is a reality.

Two back-handed slaps to that sadist bitch of a fever, who is keeping the temperature -running-, almost reminding me of what I cannot do for the next three days, or the remaining of my life, whatever comes earlier, ceteris paribus.

They say your whole life -runs- before your eyes before you die. Sadistic little piece of shit.

Anyway, at least the fever got this blog -running- again.

Goddammit!

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Image Source: nottheworstcomic.com

You're Not Transformed Yet

As you wrap up your last class, submission and exam – this year is not yet over. Not until, aside from the life in denial, the transformation is complete.

I remember before I accepted my admission offer, there were friends who mentioned that I should’ve applied to schools outside the country, as ISB was on a growth spree – while in ranking, but more specifically in its intake year-on-year. There were arguments against the quality of the institute’s churn out as well as against its placement focused, rat-race culture. I was told that I probably settled while I could shoot higher – all personal opinion, mind you. And I walked in with thinning hair but thickening confidence.

Within a week, the fellow Chartered Accountants seemed more accomplished; the engineers definitely smarter. And why wouldn’t they when it’s expected for CAs to be math geeks while the JEE experienced ace at financial equations.

I hope my conceitedness can be forgiven for I thought I could walk into this institution and rule it for having settled for something in India rather than moving farther from home, whereas my classmates would be those for whom this was a dream come true. It’s a pity how far some of us can imagine ourselves from reality.

Now, what would you do but transform when your bubble of self-assurance bursts. This year, as many of our alums mentioned during the O-Week, is a humbling experience. You’re amidst a pack of doyens, ready to sprint and grab what you’ve laid your heart on while you trot on a Jaipur foot. Or Delhi foot, or Bombay – coming from cities where egos inflate with small achievements.

The year was tough to begin with: a feeling of loneliness, never-before-experienced competitiveness and given by a few instances at the squash court, head-breaking if not cut-throat competition. It took months to figure out how this world works, cracking case-studies, making resumes, attending interviews and running calculations of ROI – like it’s so easy to put a percentage on experience.

We’ve seen brave-hearts with GPA 4 rejected by companies by the dozen and party-planners get the highest of packages. And then we’ve found ourselves in the middle somewhere – either with changed career paths or hands folded in gratitude for being blessed with a job-profile that we think we were only lucky to bag.

We’ve all humbled through the year, as most of us will claim on our way out. However, it’s important to remember that true humility is not a result of undervaluation of one’s talents and accomplishments. It differs from a phase of dealing with relatively low self-confidence. We’ve been in an environment for a year that put us amidst the smartest bunch of 900 we can possibly never find ourselves in again. The world outside will have a more rich portfolio of skills, abilities and talents – not all of which we may have learned to appreciate in whatever degree they present themselves in.

Maybe, the test of our true humility will be when we realize that anyone else we interact with may have probably done better or at least just as well as we may have, had they found the same opportunities for growth as all of us were lucky enough to find not just at ISB, but even before and much after.

With this, we’re almost ready to sign off, knowing that we were definitely blessed to have been a part of this cohort. We leave with dreams to fly, to achieve much more than what we thought we could before coming to the Indian School of Business. Among all these hopes should be the dream to create platforms for others to achieve – for hopefully, that would be the mark of the true to its core, humble leaders from the PGP Class of 2017. The test of transformation awaits.

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This piece was addressed to the PGP (MBA) Class of 2017 at the Indian School of Business on 31st March, 2017 - a week before their convocation.

Image Credits: Venkataragavan Sabesan

The Case of Hindi, Sanskrit and Maternal Influence

It was an early Sunday morning and I had quite ambitiously managed to capture the look of someone who parts his hair with a generous smear of Arnica hair oil and stares blankly at his math textbook in an attempt to show sincerity to the feminine parent walking in and out of the room, instructing the domestic help to wipe the edges of the floor in compensation for the weekday she took off the previous week. While it seemed like I had completed my Masters in verbosity and a false sense of ability to appreciate literature, as reflected in the previous sentence, a big question about my literary pursuits through high school remained unanswered.

Should I be taking Hindi as my second language in the ninth grade or Sanskrit?

The answer was as simple as choosing between Jennifer Aniston and Jennifer Lawrence. It’s best to pick the one you relate to more. Not like I relate to being the emotionally distraught female lead in Silver Linings Playbook, but if it counts, I share my birth year with Lawrence. So, as I had almost made up my mind to pick Hindi, my mother decided to relate to the one she shares her birth year with and picked Sanskrit.

The arguments in defense of my choice were one, that I topped my class in Hindi the previous year, and two, I enjoyed the subject. Also, I hated studying Sanskrit. But then of course, haha, who said that mattered? ROFLOL overbearing parents *cough*

The Mother’s argument was that Sanskrit was more scoring. Made sense if the discussion was about who among Aniston and Lawrence scored more in the number of husbands till date, but then of course, haha, who said that I scraped through the class average only in Sanskrit while topping Hindi mattered? ROFLOL children’s interest *cough cough*

As both parties found themselves at a deadlock, an arbitrator (The Father) was appointed, who performed his duty to the fullest by appreciating the Gobhi Paraunthe heavily that morning and awarded that the subsidiary company comply with the holding company’s mandate in line with the Ahuja Group’s overall objective of unhindered growth and peaceful organizational culture.

The defeated party cried foul, and on insistence of the Maternal Highness, the matter was directly thrown to the highest appellate authority, Hon’ble Sri Krishna.

The Mother initiated me into the process quite diligently. An equal number of chits with each ‘Hindi’ and ‘Sanskrit’ had to be prepared and placed before the Hon’ble Bench. The proceedings involved an hour long recital of Saraswati Chalisa, Hanuman Chalisa, Krishna Chalisa and the Gayatri Mantra, which both the Mother and I sang in unison, followed by the Lord’s Prayer which I had learnt in school and only I recited as a closing argument. The Mother attempted to beat the little cymbals in rhythm to “Our Father, thou art in heaven…”, and in effect, did not let me have the last word before His Highness because “do not bring us to the test, but deliver us from all evil… om shanti shanti shanti om”.

The Lord gave his decision by inaudibly suggesting that I pick a chit. I complied.

“Hindi”, the chit said.

“Woohoo!”

“Shut up, you’re taking Sanskrit.”

P.S. I scored a 95 in Sanskrit in my tenth grade. Who knows, I would have scored a perfect score on Hindi had the judgment not been vetoed by the other party.

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Image Source: cepuckett.com

Raees: When You Listen to Your Mum, But You Don't

Have you heard of the barebottoms? They’re shoes without soles. These shoes are synonymous to a character named Raees Khan - who looks the part, but again, lacks a soul.

The movie, Raees, begins with a young titular character running errands for a local bootlegger in Gujarat. While he’s endearing as a school-goer and otherwise, he loses sincerity immensely to the screenplay, proportionally as he grows in age. The character’s life and decisions rest on one teaching given by his mother: “Koi bhi dhanda chhota nahi hota, aur dhande se bada koi dharm nahi hota”. While on paper, the line looks like it has weight to develop a fan-following as did the Abhishek Bacchan starrer, Guru; on delivery, it appears like a stillborn. In an industry where “in kutton ke saamne mat naachna” has maintained its cult status after half a century, it’s interesting to debate whether Raees lost its charm in execution (where Shah Rukh Khan’s acting was on point) or in writing (when Jaadu’s alien-voiced ‘Om-Om-Om-Om’ appears as a more memorable line, repetition and alliteration not-withstanding).

The first half shows the young entrepreneurial boy setting up a bootlegging business in competition to his godfather. His rise makes you feel for him. You cheer for him when you see him thrash goons with a goat’s head when he tries to set up a small meat selling stall during Eid. It makes you want to give up your 9-to-5 at Infosys and wishing that much like Raees’ employer, Narayan Murthy had thrown his Titan (because he doesn’t wear Rolex despite being able to afford it) at your face, that would’ve triggered you to walk out of that beautiful Mysore campus and pursue your start-up dream. However, as the gangster’s empire grows in size, so do the plot-holes.

Nawazuddin Siddiqui as Officer Majmudar is a delight on screen, and makes up for all the charm that we’re otherwise used to seeing SRK exude, albeit off-screen. He is an honest police officer who despite humbly accepting transfer orders, is bent on obtaining evidence against Raees Khan’s misdeeds. When he blocks a road to nab one of the protagonist’s trucks, Raees Khan shows his ‘baniye ka dimaag’ and ‘miyan bhai ki daring’ by taking another route into the state. Woot! Further, when the police blocks all roads, the ‘baniye ka dimaag-miyan bhai ki daring’ comes up with the masterplan to use the waterways to get liquor in. Double Woot! While Raees’ trucks evade the barricades on each occasion, a sense of dismay sets in not because you realize the lack of infrastructure with the Indian police to close all possible modes of entry, but because the movie ridiculously insults a baniya’s dimaag and a miyan bhai’s daring by expecting you to celebrate the move as if it were worthy of an Olympic gold, or okay, to be realistic, the logistics version of a Spelling Bee trophy.

During the second half, Raees Khan uses all his funds to contest elections for the Legislative Assembly so as to strengthen his political ground for business sustenance, and then spends his savings in working capital for building a residential colony for his vote-bank. The character loses sincerity when it’s apparent how his decisions are business related, but he expects the audience to believe, with tears in his eyes on one occasion, that it’s all for the benefit of his community. One would defend it in the name of Corporate Social Responsibility – business while looking after the needs of the community. However, the sense of Robinhoodness that awakens in our gangster appears more like a sham trust-deed to avail tax benefits than sincere CSR spending of up to two percent of your net profit¹ – consequently, you fail to feel for the character anymore.

A proviso to the lesson given by Raees’ mother was: ‘as long as your dhanda hurts nobody’. One would hate to turn this into a moral debate, but in the context of this movie and otherwise, how would you define ‘hurt’?

Is making alcohol available for people to turn into drunkards not a kind of ‘hurt’? Maybe not as per most moral compasses. Is murdering competitors and politicians in an attempt to set up an illegal business not ‘hurt’? Maybe not when like most people in the world, the characters murdered are themselves grey, regardless of the shade of grey they exhibit when compared to the murderer.

The character realizes ‘hurt’ when he’s made an instrument to import explosives for a devastating blast in the country. The guilt hits him so hard that he surrenders to the police and in the penultimate scene, questions Siddiqui if he will be able to live with the guilt of murdering Raees. *long pause to let that sink in*

The movie flails in maintaining sincerity while attempting to showcase a gangster with a heart of gold – which in my opinion, there was none.

The closing scene shows Siddiqui moving away with his army of officers into their patrolling vehicles, leaving Khan shot dead on the highway side. The shot would’ve earned Siddiqui street-cred for the swag with which he walks back, except it brings none because you’re left wondering why the police would drive off without taking the fugitive’s corpse. When thoughts such as this overshadow the emotion a scene attempts to generate, you know that something has failed.

“Battery nahi bolne ka”, I said as my friends pointed out that my glasses are similar to Raees’ big frames. So here go 2.5 jalebis because I walked out with a memorable line nevertheless.

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¹demerits of letting a Chartered Accountant do movie reviews